QBE's Houghton exits ICA board as Groves takes her seat

QBE's leadership handover in Australia has now reached the boardroom of the Insurance Council of Australia. Sue Houghton, who leaves the insurer at the end of December, finished up as an ICA director on 31 October. Jonathan Groves, who took over her job as QBE Australia Pacific chief executive the following day, joined the council's board as a non-executive director from 1 November.

The swap means one of the country's biggest commercial underwriters keeps its voice inside the industry's main lobby group without a single day's gap.

The ICA board is where the large carriers settle the sector's line on affordability, disaster resilience and the General Insurance Code of Practice before it goes to Canberra and the regulators. Groves joins a board chaired by Suncorp chief executive Steve Johnston, alongside the heads of IAG, Allianz, Zurich, Hollard and Lloyd's in Australia.

Nearly nine years at the table

Houghton's time on the ICA board actually predates her QBE career. She joined as a non-executive director in February 2018, and when the board made her president in July 2020, she was still running Westpac's insurance business. She steered the council through a stretch dominated by bushfire recovery, floods and COVID-19, and held the presidency until the end of 2021.

On taking the role, she said the industry needed to deliver insurance that was "sustainable and affordable into the future". Six years on, that is still the argument insurers are having with government, only louder.

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QBE told the market in July that Houghton intended to retire at the end of 2026 after more than five years with the group and a financial services career running past 35 years. The council has thanked her for her service as both director and president.

A risk specialist takes the seat

Groves' path to the job was confirmed in September, when QBE named him to succeed Houghton at the head of the Australia Pacific division. He has more than 30 years in insurance, 13 of them at QBE, spread across business leadership, underwriting, risk and regulation.

Much of his QBE career has been spent on the balance sheet side of the house. He has served as chief risk officer for Australia Pacific and as chief risk officer of Equator Re, the group's captive reinsurer. QBE's leadership biography adds earlier underwriting, broking and consulting roles in the UK and London markets, Bermuda, Australia and New Zealand. Immediately before the promotion he ran QBE Pacific as chief executive and managing director.

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What it means for brokers

For intermediaries, the practical shift is that a former chief risk officer now speaks for QBE when the big insurers thrash out the industry's position. The council's 2025 annual report says it has lifted two priorities above the rest: closing the insurance protection gap and building trust by meeting customers' needs better. Both run straight into risk appetite, pricing and catastrophe exposure, which is familiar ground for Groves.

He also arrives with plenty on his own desk. At the half-year, QBE's Australia Pacific business reported gross written premium broadly flat, low single-digit rate rises and a combined operating ratio of 88.2%, up from 86.8% a year earlier. QBE's half-year investor presentation puts much of the slip down to the January bushfires, with the division's catastrophe claims ratio climbing to 8.4% from 7.2%.

That still left Australia Pacific well ahead of International, at 91.6%, and North America, at 97.3%. Growth is the softer number. On a constant currency basis the division's premium was flat, while International grew by around 9% and North America by around 5%.

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With volumes softening across several commercial portfolios and new capacity entering the market, brokers will be watching to see whether Groves leans towards protecting margin or chasing volume. His seat on the ICA board will not answer that question, but it does put QBE's new local chief in the room where the industry's response to softer conditions, climate exposure and regulatory pressure is shaped.

Houghton stays with QBE until the end of the year.

Panel: who sits on the ICA board

The directors below are taken from the ICA's board page, last updated 14 September 2026, with Groves added from 1 November.